


Immeasurable Worth

by Guardian_of_Hope



Series: General Buir and Commander Ad [2]
Category: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Bonding, Found Family, Gen, General Buir and Commander Ad, post Malevolence Rising
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-06
Updated: 2017-04-06
Packaged: 2018-10-15 11:38:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,102
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10555674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Guardian_of_Hope/pseuds/Guardian_of_Hope
Summary: Jedi Master Plo Koon has a talk with his commander about things said during their time in the escape pod.





	

**Author's Note:**

> As this is part of my Search, Rescue, and Retrieval 'verse (or SRR verse), I would remind you that there is canon for their existing a CC-3636 as our Wolffe, and another clone as CT-3636. This one, I chose to name Bexar. (The x is silent).

Wolffe sighed as he looked over the spare armor that the 501st had made available for him to use.  It was all impersonal, shiny in the way only new armor could be.    He picked up the blank bucket, wishing he had his own.  Bexar had painted the wolf’s head on the helmet, but hadn’t been able to add the bear paw beside it before the Call to Action had sounded.  It was the only piece of Bexar’s art that Wolffe had, and now it was lost, like his brother.

The armor door slid open and Wolffe turned, ready to growl at whoever had disturbed him, only to leap to his feet as General Koon came in.

“General, sir,” Wolffe saluted.

“At ease, Commander,” General Koon said, “I wished to speak with you for a moment.”

“Of course, sir,” Wolffe said.  He waited until General Koon had sat on the bench before he eased back down.

“You are selecting new armor?”  General Koon asked.

“Didn’t exactly care for sitting around, waiting for rescue,” Wolffe replied, picking up one of the gauntlets and turning it over in his hands, “And I lost all of mine.”

“I thought your armor was custom made?”  General Koon asked after a moment.

“It usually is,” Wolffe said, “but sometimes you need to replace something, so keeping a few sets around is helpful.”  He held up the glove, “It’s not like we need individual sizes, we’re clones, one size fits all.”

“That is an attitude that concerns me, Commander,” General Koon said, “I presume you heard Boost say something similar?”

Wolffe shrugged, “It’s the truth, sir.  We’re like our armor, interchangeable.”

“I do not believe that,” General Koon said.

Wolffe considered for a moment, then reached over to put the gauntlet down, “Sir, you’re entitled to your beliefs, but it doesn’t change facts.”

“It does when your so-called facts are wrong,” General Koon insisted.

“Don’t tell me I’m wrong,” Wolffe said, standing up as his anger surged, “not me.  You think you know us?  What our life was like on Kamino?  Forgive me for saying, sir, but you don’t know _anything_ about it.”

“Try me,” General Koon said, also standing up and crossing his arms.

Wolffe started at the General, at the mask and goggles that hid every cue he could have about what his General was feeling.  He considered it, what he could tell the General, how much trouble he’d be in before this was over.

“I will not discipline you,” General Koon said, “I only wish to understand, Commander.”

Wolffe snarled and moved away from the General, picking up a vambrace as he walked by.  “Sometimes, in the tubes, the embryo splits.  Doesn’t happen often, but it happens.  It’s the only anomaly that doesn’t get an embryo aborted, but it doesn’t mean that it’s the end of it all.  When your batch comes out, and you make the thirty-day mark?  They give you the same designation.  Because the weaker twin will be marked as defective, and defective clones aren’t worth keeping around when the service ranks are filled.  So, from the first moment, you’re in competition, to live.  When you fail, you never know if that’s it, that’s when you hit the defect limit.  Those tube-mates?  They’ve got it worse, because the trainers are right there with the longnecks, trying to pull you apart.  None of them ever cut tube-mates slack and if you try to work together, to stick together?  They’re three times as hard.  And if a batchmate or unit member becomes a defect?  They drag the defect out and send in the replacement at the same time.  Interchangeable, disposable, made to fight and die, that’s life on Kamino.”

General Koon was silent, only the faint sounds of his mask as he breathed filled the armory.

Wolffe chucked the vambrace back in its place.

“You had a tube-mate,” General Koon said.

“Have,” Wolffe replied over his shoulder.  “We made it to the Call to Action together.”

“He was not with us,” General Koon said.

Wolffe’s laugh was bitter, “No.  The trainers split Bexar into another squad to try to prove something, I guess.  Then the Call to Action came and he was assigned to a different battalion.  I don’t even know which one.  He could be dead, for all I know.”

“I do not think so,” General Koon said thoughtfully.

Wolffe pressed his hands against the table holding his chosen armor, not looking at the General.

“Wolffe, look at me,” General Koon said softly.

Wolffe hesitated a long moment before he turned to his general.  The Kel Door’s expression was still hidden, but Wolffe felt as if behind the goggles, General Koon’s eyes were seeing all the way through him.

“You are a sentient being,” General Koon said, softly, almost gently.  “As such, you are a part of the Force the same as me.  If you know how to look at the Force, you can see every life out there, like a field of stars.  None of those stars are the same, no more than the lives lived are the same.  Your life has worth, immeasurable worth.”

“But I’m just a clone,” Wolffe whispered, the voices of a thousand shouting in chorus.

“You are Wolffe,” General Koon said firmly, “you are not just anything.”

Wolffe wanted to think of something to say, but his words deserted him.

“I will find your twin,” General Koon announced.

“Why?”  Wolffe whispered, hearing the thousand questions within it.

“Because you deserve happiness.  Not because you have done something to earn it, not because I wish you to be in my debt, but because you exist and deserve happiness.”

“If you find him,” Wolffe began.

“Then he will be transferred to the 104th if you both so desire,” General Koon replied.  He reached over slowly to put his hand on Wolffe’s shoulder, “Wolffe, I would count you among my few friends, and I am glad you survived today.  The pain I would feel from your loss is no small thing.”  He released Wolffe and stepped back seconds before the door opened again.  “Finish selecting your armor, Commander, we have a battalion to rebuild and a war to win.”

“Yes sir,” Wolffe said, trying not to stare as General Skywalker leaned around the door.

“Master Koon?”  Skywalker said softly.

“Yes, General Skywalker?”  General Koon asked.

“The council is ready for you,” Skywalker said.

“Thank you, General,” Master Koon said.  “You have your orders, Commander.”

“Yes sir,” Wolffe said with a salute.  As he watched General Skywalker follow General Koon away, Wolffe held his breath, just watching.  Something was changing.


End file.
